How do you monetise online content without the intrusion of advertising? That’s the million dollar question and perennial problem for media owners and content publishers trying to balance user experience with the commercial necessity of ads and paywalls. But what’s the solution?

Google recently threw its hat into the ring with the launch of Contributor, a new service giving online publishers an alternative revenue stream to advertising, generated by offering ad-phobic web users the chance to browse their favourite sites, without interruption, for a one off payment or subscription.

With The Onion and Mashable amongst the first sites to participate, Contributor is focusing on those smaller niche sites where advertising is likely to be the primary revenue source. While its intentions appear to be user focused, the move begs the question: why is the world’s biggest internet advertising company trying to save us from internet advertising?

Counter-intuitive

Google knows that online publishers are the lifeblood of the internet, so on one hand it would be in its interest to try and help these publishers stay in the game by providing an alternative revenue stream and opportunity to keep the ad-haters happy.

Google itself has a business model largely built around the revenue it generates through advertising, whether that’s paid search or display, which surely makes Contributor counter-intuitive?

Google’s decision to launch the service is made even more confusing by the limited success that other organisations have had with this model. Whilst news staples like The Sun and The Times have implemented a pay-wall feature, other online publications haven’t followed suit.

While the user experience is currently at risk due to the direction that advertisers and their ad units are going, when you look at the very small uptake of programmes like AdBlock it suggests that the majority of the online audience accepts the value-exchange of seeing ads in return for getting great content for free. Even 30% of current AdBlock users are open to some types of advertising, citing intrusive ad formats as the key reason why they chose to block ads (Adobe/Page Fair 2014).

Google is also just one ad platform in the market. There are many others that will continue to serve these users ads. So how is the service viable?

In fact, the Contributor model could end up making these 'harder to reach' users who are largely immune to advertising suddenly become a sellable market. If this is the case then it won't take long for the general public to smell a rat.

Where’s the golden egg?

Netflix and Spotify have both shown that it's possible to make the monthly subscription model work. However, key to the success of both offerings lies in the exclusive content that only subscribers can access. For Netflix it’s things like Breaking Bad and House of Cards, whereas Spotify’s premium subscribers get a range of benefits like enhanced mobile and desktop features and higher quality audio.

For Google Contributor to stand a chance of solving the advertising vs user experience dilemma once and for all then publishers and media owners are going to have to come-up with a way of rewarding subscribers beyond simply removing the ads.

For me the launch of Contributor raises way more questions than answers. However, we’ll soon be able to see just how much users are actually willing to pay to keep online ads at bay, if at all.

 

By Thomas Jones, Digital Advertising and Marketing Manager at Snack Media. 

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